BTR News: Thank God For Guest Columnists, we appreciate the back up although your about 7 months late to the ball game.

I'd like everyone to remember we (Sons of Liberty Riders RC / Texas Biker Radio News) were all over the for profit jails in Mclennan County and the Lasalle Corporation in the early hours after 177 bikers were arrested with million dollar bonds.

At that time we didn't buy that it was really about sending a message, you see these corrupt people work together.

Understand there are campaign coffers to fill. That's the reason you see stupid statements after a man dies due to mistreatment at the hands jail employees. "We think they’re excellent operators and, unfortunately, sometimes things like this happen,” said McLennan County Commissioner Scott Felton". He's now on the radar, has he ever received a campaign donation from the Lasalle Corporation or one of its executive board members? We're just asking?

You see in the "Good Ole Boy Systems" they always have each others backs.. until the wheels fall off when people like us expose them.

Twinn Peaks: Its incredible how everything fell into place just hours after the Twinn Peaks ambush led by the DPS on May 17th 2015. This is when we thought it was more about filling jails and holding them as long as possible. We immediately started looking at their for profit jails and who benefits. From what we've learned from people in Waco this was and still is their MO. If you do not have money and understand the corrupt good ole boy system you are basically screwed since DA's all across this country will lie, cheat, steal in order to convict. Truth falls victim in favor political motivations and greed.

​The Bikers families had to report the Mclennan County jails to the Texas Commission on Jail Standards get needed food and medicines due to the mistreatment.

All along we felt the lure of the dollar takes over and then its about money. Thats where the guys like Judge Peterson and Reyna come in. Arrest, charge, drag it out as long as possible. We called it catch & hold.

If you remember it didn't take long for the Waco Tribune to start talking about the value of all the motorcycles & vehicles and the profits that might come their way from legalized theft. Lets give them honorable mention since they did report DA Reyna has dipped into the LE theft ring. yep bought a 18 wheeler if I remember right.

​Hell we ain't even mentioned the ankle bracelet racket yet....

One last comment, when profits become the motive for law enforcement, the courts. and Counties. Their vision becomes skewed, political corruption soon follows as the corporate monies begin to flow. Bank on it!

Waco is a prime example...

News Organization could have great impact on this corruption that runs rampant all over the State of Texas. They have the money and talent to do the proper research. In many cases like Waco the media already has everything on file and know just who has been corrupted and by whom. It takes guts to tear down a system like six shooter junction that's been in place for a 100 years.

Last month, McLennan County received a notice of non-compliance from the Texas Commission on Jail Standards after the death of 25-year-old Michael Martinez in the Jack Harwell Detention Center.

Three employees of the privately run jail have been arrested and charged with forging government documents after they allegedly covered up the fact that they were not performing visual checks on at-risk people — a violation of federal law. Records indicated that jailers had checked on Martinez within the required half-hour time span, but an investigation revealed that Martinez had been hanging for almost three hours when found.

LaSalle Corrections is the for-profit company that runs the Jack Harwell Center for McLennan County. “We think they’re excellent operators and, unfortunately, sometimes things like this happen,” said McLennan County Commissioner Scott Felton.

But that’s not what families with loved ones in that jail say. At the Texas Jail Project, we have received pleas for help from families concerned about loved ones being refused mental-health treatment, essential medications and medical care.

Several days before Christmas, another story came to light when the Tribune-Herald revealed that a formerly jailed 30-year-old woman filed a lawsuit in Waco’s 170th State District Court against LaSalle Corrections. The lawsuit alleges she was repeatedly sexually assaulted at the facility and goes on to describe an out-of-control institution rife with smuggling, extortion and drug abuse.

Felton’s description of LaSalle as “excellent operators” is strange considering these incidents as well as the history of this facility. Last year, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) removed all immigrant detainees from the Jack Harwell Center after ongoing claims of civil rights violations by attorneys and advocates. Prior to May of 2013, another private contractor of this facility, CEC, was cited for sexual abuse and other violations.

Despite ongoing controversy, McLennan County renewed its contract with LaSalle last year with the addition of a 90 percent occupancy clause: If the jail is filled with fewer people than 90 percent of its available beds, LaSalle can end its contract with a 90-day notice. We believe that a jail should not have a contracted mandate to stay full because that results in a deliberate effort to increase the number of arrests. This does not make Waco a safer community and intensifies mistrust of law enforcement.

Predictably, jail population increased from 85 percent capacity in January 2014 to 93 percent capacity this past November. In response to those numbers, a LaSalle executive actually said, “We have been blessed to have a relatively good history of increasing the jail population for our clients.”

That statement reveals a callous disregard for the citizens of this area and demonstrates how a for-profit jail company exploits its role. LaSalle seeks to satisfy its clients — its shareholders — no matter the cost to vulnerable families and to “the least of these my brethren.”

McLennan County now has the fifth largest incarceration rate among Texas counties, despite a lower-than-state average violent crime rate. As of Nov. 1, 75 percent of jailed people in McLennan County were pretrial. That means they have not been convicted of anything and, except for a few rare cases where bail is denied, are waiting in jail because they cannot afford to post bail.

The people of McLennan County deserve better. McLennan County should take steps to ensure that a facility this important to thousands of Texans be operated by administrators who are committed to more than a profit margin.